Current mood:

satisfied

Audioslave!! 22.6.2005 (Now with Bonus Photos!!)

Tom Morello's hand written setlist, with his Soul Power pick and autographed by the man himself. Chris played "All Night Thing" after "BHS"




The Brixton Academy, night three.


Yeah, you play that guitar Tom!


Tom Morello is cooler than you...


What, you think I'm kidding?


Chris and Tim are too. Sorry.


One crowd surfer got tossed up really high.


Tom doing that thing he does oh so well.


"Hi, I'm Tom. I kick severe ass. Nice to meet you."


The Soundgarden songs get their own guitar as is seen for "Loud Love".


Artificial Red


Yeah Chris, you'd better recognise!


It's the shadow of the sun. No, seriously.


This is where we sing "Black Hole Sun"


You can sort of see Brad back there. Hi Brad!


No, I Am the Highway


Chris is gonna show you how to live now, kids.


Bow to Tom!


Fuck you! I won't do what you tell me!


"Cochise" to close...


Tom kindly signing for his fans after the show.

Hopefully I'll write a nice review tomorrow or something. Okay, maybe after the dissertation... or on a break. Tonight rocked!

Addendum:
The opening band was perhaps the worst opening band I've ever seen. It was an absolute mess. They had two drum kits. There is a reason why you never see that. To make matters worse it was a constant game of musical chairs. One of the drummers would swap with one of the singers. Three or four of them sang lead during the six song set, none of them successfully. One of the guys used one of those dual guitars, 12-string on top, 6-string below and proceeded to use only the 12-string to play only one chord. And the 'frontman' was clearly a dick. So if you ever have a chance to see ...Trail of the Dead, run. Run fast and run far.

After a good 45 minutes of waiting after those losers left the stage, the light finally dimmed and it was time.

After opening with "Your Time..." (seeing Tom do that solo is amazing)Chris greets everyone before announcing "We're Audioslave and this song is 'Spoonman'" almost as if to reclaim it for their own. They tear through it, giving Tim, Tom, and Brad a chance to showcase their skills individually.

Chris next tells us that "The Worm" is next, which received a weak response for what I think is a great song and they more than did it justice. They went on to hammer through some of their best tracks from Exile and I stood (well... was sandwich against the barricade) in awe of Tom. He is really a pleasure to watch play.

At one point Chris points out the signs next to the stage which have three stick people standing and one lying arcoss the top of the, in a big red circle with a slash through it- No crowd surfing. Cornell goes on to talk about growing up crowd surfing and how important it was to him.

Chris again spoke to the crowd after "Drown Me Slowly", saying "For any of you who are fifteen here, this song was written... just before you were born." We were then treated so some old school Soundgarden with "Loud Love".

The set closed with "Shadow on the Sun". It was a well needed break from a good 50 minutes of constantly being crushed, though security did an excellent job of providing us with water between each song as it was quite draining between the heat and the physicality of it all. After a few minutes Chris returns with his acoustic in hand and dedicates "BHS" to someone's wife who gave birth that day. After the solo he holds up the mic as the crowd sings the next chorus. He introduces the next song, saying that he has only played it once or twice in his life. We are then treated to Temple of the Dog's "All Night Thing". I don't think most people there were very familiar with that one.

This was followed up by "I Am the Highway", during which Chris stopped to ask if there was some sort of competition going on down front as people were constantly being pulled out and over the barrier by security. He was soon joined by the rest fo te band to finish the song. Tom had changed from his dress shirt, tie and vest into a black "Arrest the President" t-shirt. The house lights were brought up for "Killing in the Name Of" which the crowd exploded for. A see of middle fingers sang along with Chris, especially to proclaim "Fuck You! I won't do what you tell me!"

"Cochise" followed to finish up the show as the flame logo lit up on the back screen. Unfortunately I saw very little of it as crowd surfers were being pulled out right over my head by security for most of the song. The band took their bows before heading off stage. Tom soaked up the cheers and tossed his pick, which landed just in front of me and I frantically encouraged this one older security guy to pick it up and give it to me. Brad then came out from behind his kit and tossed out his sticks before leaving the stage.

People begin to leave and the techs came out to disconnect everything. Tom's tech comes and undoes his pedal board. I called out 'Can I please have a setlist?' Remarkably the guy hops right over to where the setlist was placed on the amp and hands it to a security guy to pass on to me. I was thrilled! This one BIG security supervisor comes over and slaps the side of my face, mafioso style, with his big ham-hock hand and says 'That makes it worth all the pain, doesn't it?'

I made my way out, careful to protect my setlist from the masses of hot and sweaty fans.

I went around to the side of the Academy, not knowing exactly where to go to catch the band. By the time I figured out the spot, Chris and Brad had left, but I was able to catch Tom after awhile and he came over to sign autographs for all of us. I asked him if he had written the setlist. He said he had and then his tech wrote the guitar settings afterward. Tom left later and slipped by us, which was pretty unnecessary but whatever.

All in all it was a loud, energetic show that was a lot of fun. The only draw back was the vocal mix as it was often hard to hear Chris over the band and the audience participation. That was the only aspect that detracted from an otherwise incredible concert.